“Thorn always changes humans into rabbits,” explained Willow proudly, “and we can tell his when we hunt because they’re white, not brown.” Rowan was busy opening doors and looking through them. Hauling flour, Seylin realized, was nothing more than stealing from the neighbors.
“What about the other people who live here and just aren’t home?” he demanded. “If you take their flour away, how are they supposed to live through the winter?” Thorn shrugged without interest. Willow cut down a sausage and sniffed at it.
“Hey!” said Thorn sharply. “Get rid of that thing. You know human food’s not fit to eat.” Willow obediently threw the sausage into the fire.
“Three good-sized bags,” called Rowan from another room. “One’s been opened, but not much is missing.”
“Great!” said Thorn briskly, going to see. Willow stayed behind. Now he was sniffing the beer. Seylin eyed the boy gloomily. Willow was growing into a very handsome elf, with all the grace and dignity of his ancestors, and here he was stalking around a farmer’s kitchen sniffing foods like a tame bear.
Rowan and Thorn struggled through the narrow pantry doorway, dragging a large bag of flour between them. They dropped it onto the neatly swept boards by the open door through which the rabbit had recently left.
“Don’t just stand there,” demanded Thorn, beckoning to Seylin. “Grab a bag!”
Dark eyes flashing, Seylin walked haughtily to the pantry and levitated the two remaining bags, floating them over to the door. He turned back to the fire, and the bags dropped with a thud. Rowan grinned at Thorn.
“Well, aren’t we fine,” he said with a laugh, but Thorn didn’t look amused.
Willow appeared in a doorway, wearing a thick coat. “Look at this!” he said in excitement, rubbing the lapels between his fingers to feel how soft the cloth was.
“No, thanks,” said Thorn. “Willow, get that thing off.”
“Aw, Thorn, why?” demanded the boy miserably. “It’s really warm.”
Rowan walked by him into the room. “It’s the wrong color,” he explained. Willow glanced down. The coat was black. His winter cloak was brown.
“I won’t say it again,” threatened Thorn. “Do you want to look like a human?” The elf boy sighed and pulled off the coat, stroking its soft wool unhappily.
“Humans have all the luck,” he muttered.
Rowan walked back into the room, holding a hand mirror.
“Irina might like this,” he suggested, handing it to Thorn. Willow came to gawk at it. He could barely remember seeing a mirror. Thorn had thrown out their last fragment after Sable had used it when she cut her face.
“That’s just what we need,” growled Thorn, “Irina sitting around making faces at herself all night.”
“Suit yourself,” said Rowan with a shrug. “She’s going to be your wife.”
“She is?” whooped Willow. “You’re joking! Wait’ll I tell her!”
Thorn looked up, his gray eyes stern. “It’s my business, Willow,” he said steadily, “and you’ll keep your nose out of it.”
“Well,” said the elf boy uncertainly, “don’t you even want her to know?”
“No,” snapped Thorn. “And I’ll tell you why. The minute she knows, she’ll start expecting handouts, pats on the back, chucks under the chin. You go that way with a woman, and she thinks she’s the piper and you’re the one to dance. You take it from me, Willow,” he concluded, shaking the hand mirror at the boy. “Never be nice to a woman.”
Willow considered this piece of advice. “I’m not nice to Irina,” he pointed out. He followed the elf leader toward the door.
Seylin hung back while the other elves left the kitchen, considering what to do. The loss of the family patriarch as well as all the flour was bound to be a devastating blow. He took his remaining money from his pocket and put it all down on the table. The next time he needed money, he’d just have to do what everyone else did: work for it.
He followed Thorn to the barnyard. A big horse came stepping out of the barn to greet them, blowing softly, ears pricked with interest. His winter coat was dull and shaggy. He was a bit of a mongrel, with legs that were too short and fine for his deep barrel chest, but his eyes were lively and intelligent.
“Oh, good, a horse!” exulted Thorn. So they were going to steal a valuable animal as well as vital winter stores.
“We don’t need the horse,” protested Seylin. “I can float the bags home with the Carrying Spell.”
“Fine,” said Thorn, “and while you’re at it, you can float home the horse, too. Look at the meat on him!” he said admiringly.
Seylin’s jaw dropped. “You don’t mean you’re going to butcher this horse!” he exclaimed.
Rowan grinned at his shocked face. “Uh-oh!” he teased. “Thorn, he’s a picky eater!”
Thorn didn’t answer. He vaulted over the fence and headed into the barn.
“Horse is good,” Willow assured Seylin. “It tastes kind of like deer.” He and Rowan climbed over the fence as well. Seylin opened the gate and walked in after them. The horse followed him, breathing on the back of his neck.
“Wool,” said Thorn. “Look up there.” Rowan went up the ladder into the loft, and after a minute, a bundle came hurtling down.
Seylin poked around the barn in search of food for the horse. He found oats and began shoveling them into a small sack. He thought moodily about the stables back in the goblin kingdom. Fine horses lived there. Marak was fond of horses, and so was Emily. So was he, for that matter. Living in the deep forest, elves normally had no use for horses and distrusted them accordingly, but he’d never read about any elves eating one before.
A noise distracted him. He came out of the barn to find his three companions chasing the horse around the barnyard, trying in vain to hoist a sack of flour onto his back.
“Stop it!” shouted Seylin. “Don’t you people know anything about horses?”
“Of course we do,” said Rowan with a laugh. “We know how to cook them.”
They were home shortly before the morning meal. Sable and Irina had taken advantage of the men’s absence to bathe and wash their clothes. Properly washed, Irina’s blond hair was a mass of soft curls, and she was very happy and bubbly, chattering away and asking Willow about where they had gone. Willow was explaining about the sausage and the coat, forgetting for the moment his moral obligation not to be nice to women.
Even Sable’s blue eyes were shining. She was clean, and she had had the luxury of combing out her black hair in peace. It looked like a crow’s wing or a piece of black satin. Thorn noticed it, and his face took on a dangerous expression.
“Didn’t you bring home anything besides horse and wool and flour?” demanded Irina. “Didn’t you bring home anything fun?”
“No,” said Willow with arrogant superiority. “Human trash isn’t for elves.”
“Oh, yes, we did,” corrected Thorn, warming his hands before the fire. “We brought something else home.”
“Did you? Thorn! What is it?” asked Irina, terribly excited.
“It’s something just for elf women,” said Thorn.
“Something for elf women?” echoed Irina, thrilled. But Thorn didn’t look at her eager face. Instead, he looked down at his dead wife and her beautiful black hair.
“It’s something Sable’s been especially interested in,” he continued. “Sable, with her sable hair.” The scarred woman stood up to face him, thoroughly alarmed. He never used her real name anymore.
“Don’t you want to know what it is, Sable?” he asked. She eyed him anxiously. There wasn’t a right answer. Everyone was staring at her, and she flashed a nervous glance at them all. Thorn reached under his cloak.
“It’s a goblin!” he shouted, holding up the mirror, and Sable cried out at the sight of herself. She threw up a hand to slap him, but she stopped herself in time and stood there gasping, her hands balled into fists.
Everyone laughed at her, even Irina, her pretty voice joining the
rest. Everyone except Seylin, who looked at her mortified expression and felt thoroughly ill. Thorn stopped laughing. He took a step toward her, his gray eyes deadly.
“Now you know what it’s like for the rest of us,” he hissed. “We have to look at it every single night.”
Seylin walked up to the elf leader, absolutely furious. “I’m leaving tomorrow,” he said coldly.
Thorn turned toward him in surprise, and Sable made her escape.
“Leaving the camp, eh?” asked the blond elf without much interest. “I guess you finally believe me about the girl. Tomorrow’s a good time for you, but not a good time for us. We’ll be working all night butchering that monster outside. I expected you to do your share.”
Seylin glared at the hateful elf.
“All right,” he said shortly. “I’ll help with the butchering, but I’m leaving the minute it’s done.”
Thorn shrugged. “Go right ahead,” he said, turning away. He looked for Sable, but she was gone. “The ugly woman left her looking glass behind,” he announced in mock concern. “Here, puppy, you might as well keep it.”
“Oh, Thorn!” gasped Irina. She took the mirror from him, unable to believe her good fortune. It was terribly hard to admire a reflection in the water. Her hair always dragged into it and spoiled the view.
Sable came back to serve the morning meal. Thorn gave her no food. He ate heartily, tipping up the bowl to slurp the last of the stew. He wiped his dirty hands and face on his remaining bread as if it were a dinner napkin. Then he flipped it through the air so that it fell in the dirt at Sable’s feet.
Don’t pick it up, thought Seylin. Don’t give him the satisfaction of watching you eat it. But the scarred woman snatched the dirty bread and dusted it off hurriedly. Such a large piece. Who would have thought he would give her so much? And she devoured it in quick bites before he could change his mind.
“Em, this is madness,” said Ruby. “He left months ago.” But Emily wasn’t listening.
“We were right here,” noted Jane, leading the way into the snowy clearing. “This is where he worked his magic. He told me not to tell anyone,” she added to Emily, “but I don’t think he’d have minded this, do you?”
“I hope not,” said Emily, looking around.
“I won’t tell,” volunteered Richard.
“What magic did he work?” asked Ruby, studying the clear sky. The stars were shining very brightly.
“He changed the constellations into wonderful shapes, like harps and wreaths and thrones. He made a flower bush out of light. He wrote my name in sparks. He made the rabbits come out of their holes and—Good heavens! What’s that?!”
A large white rabbit came crashing out of the frozen underbrush and collided with Jane’s legs. Then it curled up on top of her feet and sat there, shivering.
“Do you think I did that?” she wondered, turning to the group. “Did Seylin give me the power to call rabbits?”
Ruby knelt down and examined the terrified beast. “That’s not a rabbit,” she replied.
Minutes later, an old farmer huddled in the snow, talking to himself, while the rest of them stood around and watched him. “‘Now then,’ I said. ‘Now, then. What’s all this?’ And then I was all over fur! Thanks, missus,” he added as Ruby handed him a flask. “Lord, you’re ugly to be an angel.”
“Do you think it was a sorcerer who did it?” Emily wanted to know. The teacher shook her head.
“That’s an elvish spell,” she pointed out. “It makes a very pretty rabbit.”
“Rabbit!” exclaimed the old man distractedly. “That’s what they made of me. A rabbit! All that blessed fur! Where’s my home? If this is heaven, I don’t like it one bit. It’s cold and soggy.”
Emily sat down next to the farmer.
“Did you see elves?” she asked eagerly. “Was one of them good-looking? Well, I suppose all elves are good-looking—but did one have black hair and black eyes?”
“They attacked me!” blurted out the man. “Busted right into my kitchen! Elves? How should I know? They murdered me! And then I was a rabbit!”
They finally got the old man onto his feet and brought him to Jane’s house, where she and her father discussed local events until the farmer gave up the idea of being in heaven. His village, it turned out, was not far away. Jane stayed home with the sleepy twins while her father drove the rest of them to the farmer’s house in a wagon.
“Seylin saved Jane from the smallpox,” he told them, “and he really saved my life, too. I had never realized how much she meant to me until I thought I was going to lose her. For the first time since her mother died, I’m not just living in the past.”
They arrived at the farmer’s cottage.
“I can’t interfere,” Ruby told Emily. “Not if elves are in the house.” But the elves were gone, and so was the farmer’s horse and all his flour. In their place was a small pile of money on the kitchen table. Emily called Ruby in to look at it.
“That’s Seylin’s money,” she pointed out. “Dwarf-made coins. He must have been with the intruders and paid for the things they took. I can’t go back to the kingdom now. He’s nearby, and I have to find him.”
The goblin woman sat down at the table to examine the little hoard. “But the children!” she insisted in dismay.
Jane’s father had been helping the distraught old man to bed. He came back into the room in time to hear Ruby’s comment.
“The twins can stay with us for a while,” he offered. “Jane and I can look after them.”
“And I want to help Em find her soldier,” noted Richard.
“I can’t allow that,” replied Ruby. “Marak has word of you children, and he wants to see you right away. And, Em, I have to be the one to take the twins to him. Marak won’t mind Martha, but he won’t want Jack in the kingdom. There’s a law against having an elf or human man ever live down there with us. But I’ve been thinking. If the right person promised to look after them in a quiet place across the lake valley, maybe the King would let them stay until Jack grows up. I have to be there to ask Marak about it before he makes up his mind.”
Emily was astounded.
“The right person? Ruby, you can’t mean you! You’re going to volunteer to raise humans? What about teaching the pages?”
“I’m tired of teaching. I want a change. You were right, I made everyone hate my class. And you know what it’s like to be a human,” said the old woman appealingly. “I can’t bear for those children to grow up without help.”
Emily sat down on the bench next to her. “I think that’s a good plan,” she said generously. “I think they need you. Go home with them, Ruby. I’ll be fine on my own.”
“I can’t allow that, either.” Ruby shook her head emphatically. “The King insisted that you were always to have a goblin nearby to guard you.”
“Well, I’m a goblin, aren’t I?” pointed out young Richard. “I can do that Fire Spell about as well as you can. And I’m not so anxious to meet this ugly King. I’d rather stay here and help Em.”
Ruby started to speak, but Emily spoke before she could answer.
“We aren’t far from Seylin now, and we aren’t far from home,” she said. “If we don’t find him quickly, I’ll bring Richard to the kingdom myself. Marak won’t mind. He’ll know you did everything he told you to do.”
They walked out into the frosty night, and Jane’s father climbed up onto his wagon. Ruby started to follow him, but then she turned back.
“Good-bye, Em,” she said. “You and Richard be careful. And”—she hesitated for a second—“and I hope you find Seylin.”
“You do?” demanded Emily, more shocked than before. The old goblin looked embarrassed.
“For his sake, really, if he wants to marry you,” she muttered. “He was always such a good boy.”
Emily stared at her nemesis, remembering their countless classroom battles. It was strange to think that she’d never realized what a brat she had been. She knew Ruby hadn’t been
fair about humans back then, but she’d never helped the goblin understand them, either. She supposed if she’d been Ruby she would have murdered a student like her.
“Ruby, there’s something I need to tell you,” she said slowly. “All those tests—all those perfect scores—”
The teacher stiffened, and her white eyes narrowed in an angry glare.
“I studied and studied to earn them,” Emily admitted in a rush. “I did all the homework, too, but I made sure no one ever found out. I studied more for your class than I did for any of the others. It was such hard work it almost killed me.”
Ruby’s lipless mouth broke into a smile so wide that it seemed it would split her face in two. But when she spoke, it wasn’t to Emily. Instead, she crooked a finger at Richard.
“Come here, you smart little goblin,” she told the street urchin. “I’m going to teach you another spell. This one tracks things and shows you where they went. Why don’t you practice it on those footprints over there?”
Chapter Eleven
The next night, Seylin was up early. He struck his tent and packed his belongings, fuming to himself. He couldn’t wait to go, but he was furious that he should have to. These were his people. They should have welcomed him. And even if they were ignorant and savage, they didn’t have to be awful. They were fools and bullies, and the only intelligent member of the band just wanted him to leave.
He went outside to feed the horse, and his heart sank at the sight of the friendly animal. He stroked the horse’s rough coat and rubbed his broad forehead. Those dark eyes watched him willingly. What are we going to do now? they asked. You’re going to become a steaming carcass, thought Seylin unhappily. And once you’re bloody bones and parts, I can leave this horrid place.
Rowan came through the door, testing the new edge he had put on his metal knife. Only Thorn had a real elf knife like Seylin’s.